


(Can't Keep Me) In the Dark

by CommanderTeatime



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s03e15 Coda, Episode: s03e15 To the Night Children, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 04:50:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18242723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CommanderTeatime/pseuds/CommanderTeatime
Summary: He feels like he’s stretched out as far as he can, laying over the edge of a cliff with his arm stretched out trying to reach for Magnus in the darkness, or waiting for Magnus to reach him and take him down too.In the middle of it all, Maryse holds her son.





	(Can't Keep Me) In the Dark

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry this is messy. I fought with it the whole way through and wouldn't let it die.

Izzy had already stopped by. 

She had done her best. She had put aside her own tears for his and managed to get him to forget about Raphael. She hadn’t gotten him to smile or say anything other than a few words. 

He had tried. He had tried to focus on her, on whatever childhood antics she was recounting, whatever tactics she was using to get him to smile, but he couldn’t bring himself away from Magnus. He couldn’t stop looking at him, watching him breathe quietly. Magnus had never been so still, not even in sleep. 

Alec had nearly found himself asking Izzy for her help, for her expertise until he realized she only worked with the dead.

It was only natural that Izzy sent Jace in after her. 

The bond was like static, Jace’s nervous energy radiating off of him like lightning in the air of a storm. Alec had felt it for weeks now, the rift between them that the Owl had created. It was almost physical, driving the two of them away like the same poles of two magnets. Jace was sitting beside him, his hand on Alec’s knee, trying to make him laugh by talking about the time they had opened Izzy’s closet and sent her images of a fashion show. It hadn’t taken long for it all to turn into a mess of sounds.

He felt himself reconnect to the world around him when Jace put a hand on his shoulder. 

“Do you want anything? Iz and I are going to go out, bring home some dinner.”

“No, thanks.” Alec heard himself say.

Jace’s hand patted him twice and disappeared. 

His own hands hadn’t left Magnus’s. He had never realized how soft Magnus’s hands were compared to his own, how perfect his fingernails, the black nail polish that he had finally been able to fix. Alec tried not to think about how they had been bloodsoaked, how Magnus had pressed them to his face in surprise and confusion. 

The memory alone ached. 

Alec looked up at the wall across from him, his thumb still tracing over Magnus’s hand, avoiding the place where Cat had placed an IV line. He wished he was a warlock so he could fix Magnus the way Magnus fixed everyone else. There had to be something he could do, a rune or something. 

Cat had taken him by the wrist after looking Magnus over and held them there, keeping him from rushing. “I don’t know what to do, Alec.” He heard it in her voice, the sound that came before crying. “I’ll… I’ll see what I can do, but this kind of magic… it’s…” Her hands were shaking against his, her eyes already full of tears. “I’m sorry.” 

It was the same phrase Izzy said, then Jace, and Aline, then whoever else came in. Someone placed a cup of tea in his free hand at some point. Alec was sure he had thanked them, but he couldn’t remember who had done it. 

If it had been a normal night, he would have finished assigning patrols. He would’ve gone over the last few reports, typed up his own, and spent the rest of the night with Magnus. He had been too distracted to arrange the schedule, and Maia had caused more than enough paperwork. Magnus’s presence in the Institute had made it nearly impossible to work anyway.

If Magnus hadn’t been in the Institute, he wouldn’t have gone with Alec when Simon called. He wouldn’t have portaled them to whatever city street Maia had cornered Heidi to. If he hadn’t been so reliant on Magnus’s magic in the first place, maybe he wouldn’t have gone to Lorenzo and traded the loft for this. 

All of it had left him breathless. 

He had to set the cup down, the heat of it gone.

The heaviness sank into his lungs once Cat started crying. It hadn’t left and Alec knew it wouldn’t until Magnus woke up and said something, until he somehow made it better because he was the only one who could. 

Magnus had held him through the nightmares of losing Jace, through the few of the Owl pressing an arrow into his chest, looking down at him with Jace’s colorful eyes. He had been there through his worst fears. 

Alec thought of how Magnus had turned away from him to portal home, how Magnus had looked so confused standing up at breakfast, and how he had passed it off as standing up too quickly. 

He looked at Magnus, every bit of hurt stung behind his eyes. Everything he wanted to say was right there, behind his teeth in a mess of anger and worry. It was everything he never had the chance to say, everything he had wanted tos ay since Magnus had smiled at him and introduced himself, already dealing with Alec’s inability to communicate. The first thing Magnus had ever said was a pun, and the last thing he had said was ‘I love you’. 

He can’t even remember the last thing he had said to Magnus. 

He wants to tell him how scared he feels, how alone, and lost. He doesn’t know what to do, he can’t figure out where to go, he doesn’t even know how either one of them has gotten here. He wants Magnus to come back just so he can ask how this happened. 

He feels like he’s stretched out as far as he can, balancing over the edge of a cliff, trying to reach for Magnus in the darkness, or waiting for Magnus to reach him and take him down too. 

“Oh, sweetheart.” 

The words startle him out of everything, away from Magnus and back into his shell of self. His mother is already in the room, her heels clicking on the floor. She’s been crying, the tears are already in her eyes again and Alec can’t bring himself to ask what’s wrong. 

He stands and her arms are around him, holding him together as he shakes and the room blurs into a mess of teal. 

“It’s okay.” 

“It’s not.” He chokes out, “it’s not.” They’re the only words that don’t feel like a lie. He can feel her hands on his back trying to soothe him like he’s six and it’s a thunderstorm. Everything inside of him is breaking and all he wants is to handle it alone, to compartmentalize his emotions and do anything, but he can’t bring himself to move away. 

He half expects her to shush him. “Not being okay, is okay.”

“He’s all I have, he’s always been there.” Alec doesn’t want to hear his own voice, the way it shudders and cracks. 

She pushes against him enough that he takes a step back and she pulls away to look at him, to look at him through her own tears and brush his hair from his eyes. “He’s not gone, Alec.” 

Alec takes his seat and almost knocks over the cup of tea he placed on the floor. “I don’t know what to do.” He rubs at his face and watches as she sits down where Jace had sat down. She rubs at her face and sighs, shaking a little. 

“We do what we always do.” She smiles through it, brushing his hair back and wiping away some of his tears with her cold fingers. “We persevere.” She relaxes an inch, “has Magnus ever left you?” 

It takes time, but he shakes his head, no. 

“What makes you think he’s going to leave now?” Her hand is on his and Alec has to stop and wonder if it’s been there for a while. 

He watches Magnus breathe in and out a few more times. He’s almost tempted to lay down beside him and hold him close, to keep him from slipping away if he ever starts to. Instead, Alec wills himself to his feet and says something-- he asks her to stay, to watch over Magnus for him. 

The world will burn before he loses Magnus, even if he has to set it on fire.

**Author's Note:**

> I had to add to the angst, sorry. I'm so excited for the next episode so I can hear Alec "Rule Are Suggestions" Lightwood say "bitch".


End file.
